I. General

Wizarding Realm (WURR) has been around a long time, and as such, our rules and guidelines have evolved to fit the needs of our members at any given time. These rules are not meant to hinder you, by any means, we just want to ensure a comfortable and happy environment for all our members.

We are comprised of many different players from many different backgrounds, so the most important thing to remember when on the site, above all, is be respectful. We will not tolerate any bullying, harassment, or any other form of disrespect on the site. Likewise, you can expect that the staff will treat you with respect as well.

If you encounter any disrespect on the site or something you see makes you uncomfortable, please PM a staff member, with any screenshots or logs if applicable.

ii. registration + sorting

If you are under 13 years of age, you must obtain parental permission before joining the site, in accordance with COPPA. This can be done by completing THIS registration form and emailing it to an administrator.

When registering, please register with a first and last name with proper capitalization. If you accidentally register in the wrong format, you can PM an admin, or request a name change under 'My Controls'. When choosing your OOC name, check out the member directory HERE to see which aliases are already in use.

After registering, you will need to be validated by email. This is in order to prevent spambots from bogging up the site. If you don't see an automated email, check your spam folder, or PM an admin!

If you live with someone who is also on WURR, or if you share a computer with someone who is on WURR, please let a member of staff know. This has been a problem in the past and we would like to avoid any confusion, especially because of our character creation system.

All Sorting forms should be completed when posted. Please see the guidelines for posting an app HERE. An admin will sort you as soon as they see your application--usually within a few minutes. Please do not PM an admin or ask in the cbox when you will be sorted.

Do not post a WIP/incomplete/in-progress sorting form. Unfinished sorting forms will NOT be sorted, as they do not meet the necessary requirements, and may be removed at admin discretion.

III. character creation

All members of WURR may start off with two characters. One is your main character and the second is a freebie character. For any characters beyond the first two, you must ask for admin permission and meet the requirements below:

Our Character Creation Requirements~

Request Admin Permission with the form below

2 weeks since your last character was created

25 posts on your last character

2 in-character posts OR 1 in-character post and 2 individual Owl threads (with at least two replies in each owl). All made by your last regular character within the last 3 months. Please keep in mind that an in-character post is an RP post. It can be a topic starter or a reply to another thread.

You absolutely may not create another character without meeting these requirements on your last character unless their character type is exempt or you’ve shelved a character to open up a slot. Freebie characters and exempt specialty characters would not be considered as the last character you’ve created. Any regular characters created without meeting the above requirements will be deleted and you will receive a suspension. So don’t do it guys, just follow the rules.

You must use the following form to request a character or your request will not be accepted:

CODE

[b]Name:[/b]
[b]Characters:[/b]
[b]Post Count for last character:[/b]
[b]Join Date of last character:[/b]
[b]Threads for last character:[/b] List them here!

At this time, there is no limit on the number of characters that you can create. We simply ask that you are active with all the characters that you have or that you shelve/delete them when they are no longer being used. To keep your face claim, we require that you post twice in two months. Any character that does not meet these activity requirements runs the risk of losing their face claim.

CHARACTER TYPES

Freebie characters are special in the sense that they never count against any character creation requirements. You can make them at any point after you make your first character with no waiting required. Every member is allowed one. Simply say that a character is a freebie character in the ‘permission’ section of the application. Freebie characters can be shelved or deleted but you may only exchange your freebie character once. After that, no other character can take freebie status even if you shelve or delete them again. Please note that you don’t have to make your freebie character right away or ever. That decision is up to you!

Exempt Character Types These are specialty characters created as awards for putting characters through the ranking system. As they are incentives, they are also exempt from any character creation rules and are earned by achieving a certain rank. Because these specialty characters function differently, they can be shelved but they can only be exchanged for another specialty character and not anything else. They are as follows:

• Clash Only (available at Novice)

• Ghost (available at Beginner)

• Hogsmeade Resident (available at Intermediate OR Advanced)

• Creature/Beast (available at Intermediate OR Advanced)

• Special Request Characters (available at Intermediate OR Advanced) - these characters may start out with their special request IF the character who achieves intermediate or advanced themselves did not use their special request option.

Use the following form to request one of the incentive types listed above:

CODE

[b]Name:[/b]
[b]Special Character Type:[/b]
[b]Ranked Character:[/b] The character you earned this incentive with!
[b]Anything Else?:[/b] Tell us about their special request, or any other pertinent details!

Professor characters function a little differently. They are subject to the character creation requirements and they are not allowed to be first characters as they are notoriously a little more difficult to plot with. To create one you first need to make sure that your class is available by visiting the teaching guide After that, PM an administrator for approval and ask that they reserve the class you want. Your reserve will be added to the teaching guide and will last for a month. Then once you’ve made them and they’re sorted, don’t forget to claim your class in the guide itself! Please note that professor characters must post one class per term or risk losing that class altogether and that you are only allowed to create one.

Hogwarts Staff: Groundskeeper, Librarian, etc. These characters keep Hogwarts running behind the scenes. To keep such positions these characters need an in-character post every sixty days. They are also not allowed to be made as a first character and you may only create one. You can, however, have both a professor and a member of Hogwarts staff.

HOW TO SHELVE / EXCHANGE/ DELETE A CHARACTER

At some point you might find yourself with no muse for a certain character. It happens to the best of us and that’s totally fine! In that case, you may PM an admin to shelve or delete that character. This exchange opens up a free character slot for you to use to make someone else without having to meet the creation requirements. It does not expire. Shelved characters can only post in certain OOC sections and their face-claims are removed and considered up for grabs.

Later on if you decide that you would like to bring back a character you have shelved, you must treat them as if you were creating a new character and thus meet the requirements to have them unshelved unless you never filled that open character slot. Then they would simply take that spot once more.

You must have a character for at least two weeks before you are allowed to shelve them.

Deletion means your character's account is completely erased from the board. There is no going back after that. If you decide you want to play them again, you would have to re-register. If you delete all your characters, you are eligible to start over with the same number of characters you deleted.

iv. posting

When posting on the in-character portions of the board, we require a minimum of five good sentences, although we highly encourage you to post more. If this is your first RP site and you aren't quite sure where to start, feel free to ask, or see THIS HANDY GUIDE for help!

Please do not use post templates, change font colors, or add emoticons in your posts. Please also keep out OOC conversation or notes out of your posts as well.

Please do not powerplay/godmod in your posts. The only character you should be moving in a post is your own character, or any NPCs if applicable.

All posted replies should be complete! Do not post WIPs as replies to a thread, as this only leads to confusion.

Written works for RP posts on the main board should be in third person. Role playing in the Trophy Case area may be written in any style.

Additionally, please do not PM any of your partners nagging them for replies. If it's been a couple of weeks since you've heard from somebody, it's okay to shoot them a PM, but repeated nagging brought to staff attention will result in a warning. Please remember that not everyone on WURR has the same availability, and as such, posting speed will vary from person to person.

Plagiarism is absolutely not tolerated in any form. If we discover you have in any way tried to pass off others' writing as your own, we will ban you immediately

v. suitable content

As the age range of our members vary, Wizarding Realm has a content rating of PG-13. In the context of the RPG Rating system, we are a 2-2-2 board. Please click the button below for further information regarding the RPG Rating system.

To elaborate:

• If your characters are having sex, please fade-to-black.
• Only characters 4th year and 14 years old and older may engage in sex; younger than that may have suggestive thoughts or encounters (eg. kissing or light touching is acceptable).
• References to past encounters are fine.
• Swearing is allowed, however warnings at the top of a post are encouraged.
• Violence is allowed but explicit acts of violence must be run past a staff member before you carry them out.
• Illegal activity such as underage drinking/partying/drugs/etc. is allowed, however if they escalate (alcoholism, drug addiction, etc.) we ask that you check with an administrator before continuing.

Singular or brief occurrences of any of these activities should come with a warning at the top of the post containing the activity. For prolonged occurrences of these activities, we ask that you be proactive and PM a staff member to have a [R] marker placed at the front of the thread in question.

There are three different types of [R] tags:

• [R] is for triggering content
• [R] is for sexual content
• [R] is for explicit language

The [R] marker does not mean the thread is now rated R. The [R] marker simply means that the thread contains multiple instances of the corresponding topic and readers should be aware of this. If you think your thread should be tagged with an R, simply poke a staffer.

We allow histories and characters with illnesses, mental and physical, and abuse, whether it be substance, physical, emotional, etc. However, please run this past a member of staff for approval before you post your sorting, as we would like to keep this site a comfortable environment for all. Please be respectful in your writing towards these issues, and make sure they are rounded in other terms, not just the matter in question.

If we see this occurring, the posts in question will be deleted, and the participants warned. For other potentially hot topics that are not listed above, whether in a plot or in a character, please run your idea past an administrator before commencing the plot. At any point in time, the admins reserve the right to stop a plot if they feel it is not being handled respectfully. Please be proactive! The administrators are here to make sure nothing gets too out of hand and not specifically to limit you <3

Out-of-character discussion of potentially triggering topics must be limited to private conversations, such as PMs or a 3rd party messenger.

vi. warning system

While banning anyone is the last thing we want to do, maintaining our rules is important as well. Breaking rules means consequences, and although we are willing to give second chances, we need to make sure our community is safe as well.

Our warning system is structured like this:

Plagiarism: Plagiarism will result in an instant and permanent ban. We will not tolerate plagiarism on Wizarding Realm in any way, shape, or form.

Unauthorized Character Creation: If we find you have unauthorized character accounts, we will take the following actions:

Harassment and/or Content Violations: For these offenses, and all other offenses staff deems necessary, we will make us of JCINK's built in warning system. You can find your warn level by going to your user profile and looking in the top left column, above your rep points. For repeated violations, we operate as such:

Note that people who have received a warning increase will not be awarded priviledged positions on the site (such as prefect, head student, review team, or wand maker) for at least 3 months, as we do not reward bad behaviour.

viii. member conduct

Respect, of course, is the most important rule here as well.

If you are having a conflict with another member, please do not drag it into threads on the site, or drag other site members into the conflict. If you are caught doing so, you may be exposed to receive warn increases as per our warning system.

On Advertising: We do have an advertising board, and that board is the only place where advertising is allowed. If we discover you have tried to advertise or ask people to join your site on the cbox or through PM, we will ban you immediately.

ix. graphics

All avatars must be 250x450 pixels wide. If you do not know how to create an avatar, we have plenty of wonderful, artistically-inclined people who would love to help you out! Images in avatars and signatures must be of individuals who are 13 years of age or older.

Furthermore, please try to keep all signatures and avatars on the site of a PG-13 nature. Absolutely no obscenity or genitalia is allowed.

If you make a face claim, please use that face claim--it's not fair to everyone else if you make the claim and then never use it.

Images in signatures should be no wider than 500 pixels, and we ask that you try not to stretch your signatures vertically too much. If you stack two signature-sized images together, your signature is too wide.

x. miscellaneous

Do not PM a staff member asking for a code. If you need help with your site, there are various resource sites which are better suited for that kind of help, or you can go to the main JCINK help forum HERE.

Staff reserves the right to change these rules at any time. We will let you know if these rules are changed, but you should check back often and make sure you're up-to-date. And of course, as always, please feel free to ask a staff member if you have any questions whatsoever!